of it. This is gathered into barrels and 

 is black because of the smoke that gets 

 into it. It was this sort of tar that 

 Benjamin Franklin had his experience 

 with one time in Philadelphia. He was 

 running along on the tops of tar bar^ 

 rels on the wharf one fine day with his 

 Sunday clothes on. The head of one 

 barrel was not in good condition, and 

 so Benjamin went down into it. The 

 next issue of his paper had a very 

 amusing account of the* accident in 

 which Franklin used his powers to 

 make puns to great advantage in mak 

 ing fun at his own expense. 



ANTS. Would you like to get a 

 clean skeleton of any small animal? 

 Place the body near or upon an ant hill 

 and the little workers will clean it off 

 for you perfectly, picking every bone 

 as clean as if they were under contract 

 with a forfeit for every scrap of flesh, 

 skin, or sinew left upon any bone. 

 They like, meat so well that they will 

 attack animals that are many times 

 larger than themselves and carry the 

 work to a successful end. There are 

 three kinds of ants in an ant hill- 

 males, females, and neuters. The males 

 and females have wings and do no 

 work to speak of. They are always 

 waited upon very carefully by the neu 

 ters who have no wings, but are noted 

 for their industry, skill, and strength. 

 It has been said that the ant stores up 

 large quantities of grain in the summer 

 for winter use. Whoever said that was 

 not well acquainted with his subject. 

 In winter the ants neither eat nor 

 work. Some of the neuters have 

 their jaws, or mandibles, made much 

 larger than the rest. These are the 

 soldiers, and they fight with greater 

 fierceness than any other creatures. 

 Huber, the blind naturalist who told 

 the world so many astonishing things 

 about bees, describes a great fight he 

 once saw between two colonies of these 

 little warriors. " I shall not say what 

 lighted up discord between these two 

 republics, the one as populous as the 

 other. The two armies met midway 

 between their respective residences. 

 Their serried columns reached from 

 the field of battle to the nest, and were 

 two feet in width. The field of battle, 



which extended over a space of two or 

 three square feet, was strewn with dead 

 bodies and wounded; it was also 

 covered with venom, and exhaled a 

 penetrating odor. The struggle began 

 between two ants, which locked them 

 selves together with their mandibles, 

 while they raised themselves upon 

 their legs. They quickly grasped each 

 other so tightly that they rolled one 

 over the other in the dust. When 

 night came they stopped fighting, but 

 the next morning they went at it again 

 and piled the ground with slain and 

 wounded." Their stings hurt because 

 they carry a liquid that is like that 

 found in nettles and in the hairs and 

 other parts of certain caterpillars. 

 This is called formic acid, and is made 

 by chemists for certain purposes. 

 The red ant dislikes to work if he can 

 get slaves to do it for him. Perhaps 

 we should say if she can get it done for 

 her, because these neuters are rather 

 more like females than like male ants. 

 They make war purposely to get into 

 the homes of other colonies to carry 

 away their eggs and baby ants. They 

 bring these up to wait upon them. 

 When they go on a journey the slaves 

 have to carry their owners, and some 

 times they even feed them until they 

 refuse to feed themselves. They have 

 been known to die of hunger with 

 plenty of food within easy reach, but 

 with no slave at hand to place it before 

 them. In going out to fight for the 

 offspring of other ants they go in 

 regular columns, and those that are 

 left after the slaughter return home in 

 the same order, their solid trains some 

 times extending more than a hundred 

 feet. Some ants keep cows. Plant 

 lice have honeydew in their bodies, 

 and when well fed they give out a 

 great deal of it. Ants are fond of it. 

 They sometimes confine the plant lice, 

 feed them, and milk the honey-dew 

 from the bodies of their captors. A 

 German scientist named Simon, has 

 recently returned from 'Australia with 

 some great stories about ants. He 

 says he suffered much from their 

 attacks. In trying to get rid of them 

 in many ways he at last hit upon the 

 idea of spreading a poison where they 

 would have to pass across it. He used 



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